


one lifetime.

by eoghainy



Category: Phantom of the Opera - Lloyd Webber
Genre: F/M, pov fic, the point of no return
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-15
Updated: 2018-10-15
Packaged: 2019-08-02 17:01:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16309157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eoghainy/pseuds/eoghainy
Summary: the point of no return from raoul's point of view.





	one lifetime.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first phantom work, & honestly i just love raoul so much thanks for coming to my mini ted talk.

He had seen that look on her face before.

Her eyes were glazed, mouth slack, all tension leaving her delicate, slender body. He had seen the expression seldom few times since the Phantom had made himself a nuisance in their life. She had offered the expression solely to the Phantom, never to him. It may have been yielded twice, or perhaps thrice, in their own ministrations, but it had never held such _passion_ in it when she let it show to him. 

His heart pounded in his throat as he watched them go about the stage, Christine falling further and further under his spell. Her demeanor changed; she seemed to become charged with a sexual energy, her body moving in ways that he had never seen from her before. She was a shy maiden with him, all soft giggles and loving smiles. 

But with the Phantom, she was a demon of desire; consumed by her deepest lust. She seemed to feed off of the attention he offered her, and watching them sing and dance together pulled sharply at his heart.

Christine did not belong to either of them, but Raoul loved her. He had loved her ever since he was a boy, as green as the grass that grew in the gardens they used to play in. This Phantom did not love her; he simply was obsessed with her. He had groomed her into his special little pet, and Raoul had gotten in the way of that. He had interrupted the Phantom’s plans of taking her, of trapping her beneath this accursed opera house in the all – consuming darkness that had twisted the Phantom beyond repair.

Raoul had shattered those plans, and he had put Christine in such a dangerous situation. He had condemned himself to watching them play their parts across the stage. Their characters had such a unresolved sexual tension, and Raoul was victim to watching them grow ever closer.

It wasn’t until the Phantom put his hands upon Christine that he felt the wind get knocked out of him. Her eyes rolled and flickered closed behind her shadowed lids, and her mouth remained slack. Her body was flush against his, and his hands were guiding hers sensually along her body, across her breasts and up the slender, soft, white column of her neck. She shuddered against him, and Raoul couldn’t tear his eyes away. 

Almost, it was arousing, to see her reveal a side of herself that he had never had the fortune to see. The fact that it was being shown to the Phantom instead of _him_ twisted his stomach, made nausea threaten to sweep over him and cast him to the waves of agony. His Christine did not love him as she should. Half of her remained with the Phantom. Half of her that he would never, ever, _ever_ get to experience.

No matter how this night came to an end. 

His fair, beautiful, sweet maiden Christine seemed to forget their carefully laid plans. He wanted to cry out to her and tell her to rip the mask from the Phantom’s face, for then they could truly begin to rid him from their lives, but he did not dare. He watched in sickening silence as her head rested against his shoulder, her body pressing even closer against the Phantom’s. Raoul’s eyes began to tear, and stubbornly, he refused to let himself cry. He would not be dishonored that way; the Phantom was no threat to him, nor to his love.

This was going to end soon, wasn’t it? She was going to come to her senses at some point, wasn’t she? 

He could sense the terse energy of the opera house, practically taste their restlessness. The police stirred, with only Madame Giry to hold them in line, waiting for the order from Raoul to send them after him, the sole enemy that he had ever had in his life. His dear love and his sole enemy were face to face, so close, here was her perfect chance! 

Raoul was willing her from the balcony, despite the burning tears in his eyes, silently begging her to act. He did not know what spell the Phantom was so easily able to cast over her with his melodic voice, but once again he had his dear Christine in his arms, stroking her hair that Raoul knew from experience was so soft, despite looking wiry and messy.

It wasn’t until the Phantom got off track that he saw Christine’s expression change.

There was a glint of horror that he managed to catch in her eyes as he, their Phantom, sang their most private, intimate song. The one they sang together in their moments stolen, with proclamations of love and adoration, of promises of their souls winding into one. But here it was, being spoken from the wrong lips, to a Christine that had awoken from her daze. The clarity had returned to her gaze, albeit tainted by sadness, and the faith that Raoul had once had come flooding back to him.

Christine, despite her crisis of whomst she was more loyal to, had chosen. She had chosen the safe, reassuring arms of Raoul, the gentle promises of love and devotion. He could not offer her the love of music like this Phantom could, he could not understand the language that she spoke when she sang and when she danced, when her body became overcome by instinct and so fluid upon the stage that begged for her presence. That was one language he did not speak, but it didn’t mean that he couldn’t indulge it, give her every happiness that she had ever craved.

She had chosen, and so had Raoul.


End file.
